POP-A-LOOZA: My Serial Thrillers

Each week, the pop culture website Pop-A-Looza shares some posts from my vast 'n' captivating Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) archives. The latest shared post is a look back at my infatuation with classic superhero movie serials, "My Serial Thrillers."

I noticed recently that Amazon Prime offers Republic Pictures' 1942 Spy Smasher serial as part of its streaming service. Well...cool. Based on the then-popular Fawcett Comics superhero, Spy Smasher was considered one of the best of the comics-inspired serials. I saw the mid-'60s feature film condensation Spy Smasher Returns on Netflix some years back, and although I'm unlikely to carve out time to watch the whole thing now, I'm glad the option exists.

In the early '70s, when I was an adolescent and young teen studying the Golden Age of Comics of the '40s, Spy Smasher fascinated me. The interest formed as a tangent to my burgeoning mania for the original Captain Marvel, a character also published by Fawcett. In a previous post, I wrote about my discovery of Spy Smasher:

"Ah, Spy Smasher was a hero to me long before I ever had a chance to see him in any sort of adventure. Like [pulp hero] The Spider (but earlier in my timeline), my interest in Spy Smasher was ignited by the comics histories I was absorbing in the '70s. My first glimpse (and probably first awareness) of Spy Smasher was in the book All In Color For A Dime, and its full-color reproduction of the cover of Spy Smasher # 1 from 1941.I saw the book on the shelf at World Of Books in North Syracuse some time in the early '70s, flipped through its pages, and I was hooked on all of these heroes of the past. 

"My interest in Spy Smasher was subsequently reinforced when I learned that--like his comrade the original Captain Marvel--he'd starred in his own movie serial in the '40s. More comics histories (especially the Steranko History Of The Comics books) continued to feed this interest. Other than his part in the 1976 JLA/JSA crossover (JLA # 135-137) and the reprint of his first appearance in DC's tabloid reproduction of Whiz Comics # 2, I didn't get to read an actual Spy Smasher comic book until years later, nor see his serial until decades later. But I was and remain a fan. It all started with All In Color For A Dime."

Fawcett's former rival DC Comics now owns both Captain Marvel and Spy Smasher. Nonetheless, a lot of their original 1940s comic book adventures have fallen into public domain, including the 1941 Captain Marvel Vs. Spy Smasher story, which I reprised here. And the cinematic serial adventures of those heroes, along with those starring Batman and Robin, Superman, The Green Hornet, Captain America, The Phantom, and Flash Gordon, are the subject of the latest Boppin' Pop-A-Looza.

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This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.

The many fine This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio compilation albums are still available, each full of that rockin' pop sound you crave. A portion of all sales benefit our perpetually cash-strapped community radio project:

Volume 1: download
Volume 2: CD or download
Volume 3: download
Volume 4: CD or download
Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio:  CD or download

Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1)will contain 165 essays about 165 tracks, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1). My weekly Greatest Record Ever Made! video rants can be seen in my GREM! YouTube playlist. And I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl.

My Serial Thrillers

When I was an adolescent and young teen in the early '70s, the past became a source of fascination for me. Movies, old radio, and especially comic books captured my attention. My favorite movie stars were Charlie Chaplin and The Marx Brothers. In addition to the great rockin' pop music I absorbed on AM radio, I also tuned in to the public station's Radio Rides Again! to hear affirmation that The Shadow knew what evil lurked in the hearts of men. And comics...! Reprints of superhero adventures from the '30s and '40s were becoming increasingly accessible—DC Comics publisher Carmine Infantino was especially keen on using reprints—and other resources even went back as far as 1929 for the debut of Buck Rogers In The 25th Century, reprised in a hardcover collection that I received as a gift. The '70s were a golden age of appreciating the pop culture Golden Age of before, during, and just after World War II.

My discovery of movie serials was part of that. Sort of. Eventually. I kinda fell into digging the chapter plays of the '30s and '40s. Prior to the '70s, I had seen chapters of the 1930s Flash Gordon serials on the afternoon kiddie TV show hosted by Syracuse's local TV vampire Baron Daemon. I was dimly aware of the silent-movie cliffhanger style of The Perils Of Pauline, though strictly as a tangent; the style manifested in the faux melodramatic Tune in tomorrow, same Bat-time, same Bat-channel! of the campy Batman TV series when I was six, and inspired the late '60s Saturday morning cartoon series The Perils Of Penelope Pitstop.

Somewhere around 1971 to '73, I found a Super 8 movie projector in our attic. These artifacts were among the earlier examples of home video, short and silent little flicks to enjoy in one's own private Bijou. We had, I think, a single Super 8 in our stash, an absurdly short edit of Abbott And Costello Meet Frankenstein. 

I was riveted.



Pretty quickly after that, I noticed Super 8 films for sale at both K-Mart and White-Modell. Prying myself away from stealing surreptitious peaks at Vampirella and Penthouse in White-Modell's smoke shop, I was drawn to Super 8s featuring Batman and the original Captain Marvel. My parents ultimately bought me two of each hero's Super 8 adventures, plus a couple of shorter Chaplin reels. More Super-8s would follow, but the format faded away soon thereafter. I never saw any additional superhero Super 8s.



The little Batman and Captain Marvel reels were taken from the characters' movie serial adventures, 1943's Batman starring Lewis Wilson and 1941's The Adventures Of Captain Marvel starring Tom Tyler. My Super 8s began to dovetail with my dawning awareness of superhero movie serials, courtesy of a chapter in All In Color For A Dime, a book collection of essays about comic books, and in On The Scene Presents Superheroes, a one-shot magazine about superhero movies, published in 1966 but still kickin' around used bookstores in the early '70s. 



In '73 or so, I attended The Syracuse Cinephile Society's screening of the entire 12-chapter Adventures Of Captain Marvel serial--with sound and everything! The first chapter of Batman (its virulent wartime anti-Japanese racism intact) was included in a film compilation called Three Stooges Follies, which I saw twice in movie theaters (at Fayetteville Mall and at The Hollywood). The Hollywood also showed the first Flash Gordon serial from 1936 over the course of two separate Saturday matinees. Vacationing at my grandparents' house in Southwest Missouri, I managed to stay up and watch two or three chapters of the 1944 Captain America serial, broadcast in their original once-a-week increments during the wee, wee weekend hours by a TV station in Pittsburg, Kansas. I also picked up a copy of To Be Continued, a hardcover history of the serials; I wish I had retained ownership of hat book, but it found a new home somewhere, victim of a purge to gather rent money circa 1980.



In February of 1976, I attended the Super DC Con sponsored by DC Comics in NYC. The film presentations at the con included some DC-affiliated serial footage, though my memory struggles to recreate the specifics. There was probably a Captain Marvel chapter, a chapter from 1949's Batman And Robin, and I think an original coming-attractions trailer for The Vigilante. I do remember that there was a fragment of a chapter from 1948's Superman; the two serials actor Kirk Alyn made as the Man of Steel were then presumed to be lost, though both were recovered in later years.



And that was probably it for my serial thrillers for a good while thereafter. Off to college in '77, graduation in '80, apartment living in Brockport and then Buffalo until the spring of '87. I bought my first VCR in December of '86. I got a VHS copy of Flash Gordon Conquers The Universe at some point, but never quite got around to watching it. When I moved back to Syracuse in '87, Twilight Book And Game Emporium offered rentals of vintage serials. The Superman serials had been recovered by then, so I borrowed and watched Superman as well as The Green Hornet and the 1943 Batman. I bought budget VHS issues of both Batman and Batman And Robin, the former with some dubbed dialogue to tone down its overt racism. I eventually added Captain America and 1950's Atom Man Versus Superman. As VHS was replaced by DVD, I got shiny serial discs of The Adventures Of Captain Marvel, The Phantom, Batman, and Batman And Robin. I also watched Atom Man Versus Superman on TV when TCM serialized it over the course of fifteen Saturdays, and a feature-film edit of the great Spy Smasher serial on Netflix.



I have to admit that I have lost most of my young passion for movie serials. TCM has been running Terry And The Pirates on recent Saturdays, and I couldn't muster the enthusiasm to watch it. Between YouTube and streaming options, I can access chapters of Blackhawk, Buck Rogers, The Spider's Web, Dick Tracy, The Green Archer, Zorro's Black Whip, The New Adventures Of Tarzan, The Shadow, and many more. But the urge ain't there anymore. I loved serials when I loved them. 



I'm still fond of 'em anyway. If I'm in the right mood, they all remain a mere click away. And with sound! The Golden Age of Comics, brought to life in sparkling (and occasionally scratchy) black and white. To be continued? Well...why not?



TIP THE BLOGGER: CC's Tip Jar!

You can support this blog by becoming a patron on Patreon: Fund me, baby! 

This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.

The many fine This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio compilation albums are still available, each full of that rockin' pop sound you crave. A portion of all sales benefit our perpetually cash-strapped community radio project:

Volume 1: download

Volume 2: CD or download

Volume 3: download

Volume 4: CD or download

Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio:  CD or download

Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 134 essays about 134 tracks, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).

POP-A-LOOZA: Star Wars, The Sandman, The Silver Surfer, The Spider, Spy Smasher, and The Seven Soldiers of Victory

Every week, the pop culture website Pop-A-Looza shares a post from my vast 'n' captivating Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) archives. This week's shared post is an Everlasting First look back at my introductions to Star Wars, The Sandman, The Silver Surfer, the pulp hero The Spider, Spy Smasher, and The Seven Soldiers of Victory.



Although I loved the original Star Wars trilogy in the late '70s and early '80s, I haven't ever had much to say about the franchise. A piece I wrote about The Monkees ("The Monkees Bring The Summer: A Girl I Knew Somewhere") contains a reference to seeing the first Star Wars movie in 1977, and my reminiscence about Flash Gordon mentions our Flash's influence on Luke Skywalker and friends. An otherwise-unrelated piece included this passage about seminal space opera hero Buck Rogers and his impact on what came after:

"In our far-future world, it may be difficult to appreciate the sheer, vast impact of Buck Rogers in the '30s. The character debuted in newspaper comics in 1929, though the strip was based on Phillip Frances Nowlan's pulp novella Armageddon 2419 A.D., which appeared in Amazing Stories in 1928. Buck Rogers was simply huge; there ain't no Flash Gordon without Buck Rogers' inspiration, no Star Trek, no Star Wars, arguably no Superman, perhaps no superhero boom at all."



So, yeah. No Buck Rogers, no Star Wars. And worse, no Princess Leia!



What else? I've written several times about the Golden Age Sandman's main inspiration The Green Hornet, including my introduction to the character, my idea for a Green Hornet '66 rock 'n' roll story (both teaser hype and the first few script pages), and a Greatest Record Ever Made! piece about "The Green Hornet Theme" by Al Hirt. I haven't written about Spy Smasher, though I have used some of the character's 1940s adventures in issues of my 100-Page FAKES! series. Not much coverage of The Silver Surfer or The Fantastic Four here, but the subject is part of my introduction to Marvel Comics and my eulogy for Stan Lee. All of my writing about The Seven Soldiers of Victory was contained within various 100-Page FAKES!, most notably this one. The Spider hasn't gotten a lot of Boppin' ink, but the Master of Men was part of my '70s fascination with superpulp paperbacks and Tony Goodstone's hardcover anthology The Pulps, but The Spider was never quite as big for me as The Shadow or Doc Savage.







And, of course, Star Wars! These few days past the official observance of Star Wars Day, let the force remain with you and with all of us. The story of how I discovered Star Wars and some other S-named favorites is this week's Boppin' Pop-A-Looza.



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You can support this blog by becoming a patron on Patreon: Fund me, baby! 

This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.

The many fine This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio compilation albums are still available, each full of that rockin' pop sound you crave. A portion of all sales benefit our perpetually cash-strapped community radio project:

Volume 1: download

Volume 2: CD or download

Volume 3: download

Volume 4: CD or download

Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio:  CD or download

Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 134 essays about 134 tracks, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).

100-Page FAKES! presents: SHAZAM! # 36

100-Page FAKES! imagines mid-1970s DC 100-Page Super Spectaculars that never were...but should have been!

Captain Marvel by the great Jim Aparo

The good folks at DC Comics had difficulty getting the right handle on the original Captain Marvel. Captain Marvel (published in the '40s and early '50s by Fawcett Comics) had been the most popular comic-book superhero of the Golden Age, outselling even Superman. Readers were fascinated by the adventures of young Billy Batson, whose magic word SHAZAM! transformed him into the World's Mightiest Mortal. DC sued Fawcett, claiming Captain Marvel was a copy of Superman, and Cap and the rest of The Marvel Family eventually surrendered and withdrew from newsstands, presumably forever.



But time wounds all heels. In the early '70s, DC licensed (and eventually purchased) its former rival from Fawcett, and commenced new Captain Marvel adventures in Shazam! # 1 (February 1973). Another rival came into play: in the '60s, Marvel Comics had scooped up the trademark on the name "Captain Marvel," effectively preventing DC from ever marketing the original Captain Marvel under his own name. That is a subject best left for another day's rant.

If Captain Marvel had not exited the public's view in 1953-54, and had instead remained in continuous publication like Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman, perhaps the character's tone would have evolved over time. Instead, the 1970s writers of Shazam! struggled and fell short of the goal of recapturing the charm of the Golden Age of Comics. There was never any attempt to give Captain Marvel a contemporary feel--and maybe there shouldn't have been--but for whatever reason, the Shazam! comic book never quite developed. Cap's original artist and co-creator C. C. Beck quit the Shazam! book in frustration with editorial clashes over what he thought were increasingly silly stories. Even with the added exposure of a live-action Saturday morning Shazam! TV series 1974-77, the comic book series couldn't sustain sufficient popularity. It went all-reprint for a while, and eventually returned to new stories before being cancelled with its 35th issue in 1978.





The final two issues of Shazam! attempted a course correction. As a kid, writer E. Nelson Bridwell had been a huge Cap fan, and his attempts to re-create the Fawcett-era adventures really weren't far off the mark; they just didn't work in the '70s, even with art by Kurt Schaffenberger, who had drawn many a Cap tale in the '40s and '50s. Shazam! # 34 tried a more contemporary art approach, courtesy of Alan Weiss and Joe Rubinstein. The switch seemed jarringly abrupt at the time. Shazam! # 35 brought in penciler Don Newton, inked by Schaffenberger, and that seemed a more natural combination of '70s comics and classic Cap. But it was too late to save Shazam!, and the title was cancelled.



Material for the unpublished Shazam! # 36 made its way into a back-up slot in the giant-sized Dollar Comics book World's Finest Comics # 253 (October-November 1978), replacing Wonder Woman (whose feature moved over to the also Dollar-sized Adventure Comics). DC's Dollar Comics included only new material, and WFC # 253 also starred the Superman-Batman team (penciled by Schaffenberger, by the way), Green Arrow and Black Canary, and The Creeper. 

 

Shazam! remained a back-up feature in World's Finest Comics through its final dollar issue (# 282, August 1982), skipping only # 271, which contained a book-length Superman and Batman story. Switching from big to small format, two final Shazam! stories intended for World's Finest Comics appeared instead in the digest-sized Adventure Comics # 491 and 492 in 1982. After that, the original Captain Marvel again disappeared for a little while. He would return.

All of The Marvel Family's appearances in World's Finest Comics were written by E. Nelson Bridwell. Legendary comics artist Gil Kane filled in for the final Shazam! back-up in WFC # 282; Don Newton penciled all of the others, with various inkers including Schaffenberger, Dan Adkins, Dave Hunt, Frank Chiaramonte, and others. It is a classic run of Captain Marvel stories long overdue for reprint and rediscovery.

These all-new DC Dollar Comics of the '70s and '80s could be a mixed bag, but ultimately they were a kick. They were well past the era of 100-Page Super Spectaculars, and past the era of DC filling books with reprints, but we're still going to create a faux 100-pager of what would have been Shazam! # 36.

And we're going to do it by slappin' together the one Shazam! Super Spec I wanted but never got in the '70s: a 100-pager including not only the members of The Marvel Family, but also some of their old fellow Fawcett Comics heroes, Ibis the Invincible, Spy Smasher, and Bulletman and Bulletgirl. Holy Moley!

The Marvel Family in "The Captain And The King!," originally intended for Shazam! # 36 (unpublished), printed in World's Finest Comics # 253 (October-November 1978)
Captain Marvel Junior (untitled), Master Comics # 73 (October 1946)
Ibis the Invincible in "Land Of Death!," Whiz Comics # 96 (April 1948)
"Spy Smasher Leads The Freedom Fight!," America's Greatest Comics # 3 (May-August 1942)
"Mary Marvel And The Curse Of The Keys," Wow Comics # 58 (September 1947)
Bulletman and Bulletgirl (untitled), Master Comics # 16 (July 1941)
"Captain Marvel and the Three Lieutenant Marvels Unite To Fight With The United Nations," Whiz Comics # 34 (September 1942)

The whole Rock of Eternity here is copyright DC Comics Inc., and shown here in sample pages; my paid patrons see the whole book. SHAZAM! Get set for adventure with the original Captain Marvel and friends.

TIP THE BLOGGER: CC's Tip Jar!

You can support this blog by becoming a patron on Patreon: Fund me, baby! 

This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.

The many fine This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio compilation albums are still available, each full of that rockin' pop sound you crave. A portion of all sales benefit our perpetually cash-strapped community radio project:

Volume 1: download
Volume 2: CD or download
Volume 3: download
Volume 4: CD or download
Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio:  CD or download

Hey, Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 100 essays (and then some) about 100 tracks, plus two bonus instrumentals, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).

COVER GALLERY